Army medic applied for and was granted a conscientious objector discharge following 2003 Afghanistan deployment.
The following is an excerpt from “Objection sustained” by Justin Ellis, Staff Writer for the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram, 3 January 2005:
Three years into a four-year enlistment in the Army, after a tour of duty in Afghanistan, Perry O’Brien said no. He became a conscientious objector.
“I had trouble justifying what we were doing in Afghanistan,” he said. He’s back after being honorably discharged from the Army. Now life has returned to some kind of normal for the Peaks Island native. He is one of a relatively small group of people to ever ask for – and receive – conscientious-objector status.
The simple history of O’Brien’s life goes like this: Young boy grows up on the island, gets home-schooled for several years, meets future fiancée and enters the University of Southern Maine to study philosophy. But in 2001, things got complicated. He wanted a change. So he enlisted in the Army to become a medic. It was two weeks before Sept. 11.
O’Brien never believed he would be near the front lines of any combat. “I wanted to expand myself in the most radical way possible,” he said with a pause. “I think it was a naive plan … an instinctual decision.” Over the next two years he would cycle between basic training at Fort Benning, Ga., to medic training in Texas, until he was stationed with a unit in 2002.
In January 2003 he was deployed to Afghanistan as a member of the 82nd Airborne Division. Working in an old airport in the city of Kandahar, southwest of the Afghan capital, Kabul, O’Brien spent his days treating everyday illnesses as well as trauma injuries among Afghan and U.S. troops. The unit also traveled into rural areas, where they set up shop in the countryside to give villagers medicine and do simple dental work. “At the time it was like the Peace Corps with guns,” he said. “That’s what it felt like.”
But soon his questions began coming… It didn’t help that he was receiving patients each day, some children, who may have been innocent victims caught in the middle of fighting… O’Brien knew that being a member of the Army would be difficult both mentally and physically, but he never anticipated it would make him question his fundamental values.
His unit returned to the states in June, where O’Brien took on the difficult task of getting conscientious-objector status from the Army.
There are two types of conscientious-objector designations: one where you are removed from combat and put in another specialty field; or, as in O’Brien’s case, discharged from the service entirely… The process takes time and leads all the way to the Pentagon, where the final decision is made. Officers carefully check a person’s history as far back as high school. Typically he or she will have shown signs either of support or questioning the Army, Robbins said. Though the Army knows a change of mind is possible while in combat, it’s also not common among the ranks. Now new recruits sign a statement saying they are not conscientious objectors.
“It’s extremely rare,” said Robbins. “We’re a large army with roughly upwards of a half million (soldiers) on active duty.”
In O’Brien’s case the process took five months. He returned home Nov. 22, just in time for Thanksgiving. O’Brien said he feels fortunate, if not lucky, to have been granted conscientious-objector status. When it comes down to it, everyone has questions, O’Brien says. He knows not everyone will come to the same conclusions he did. He also knows that some people will disagree with his decision to leave the Army, and that’s something he respects.
Juggling conflicting ideas about war, diplomacy and peace while fighting overseas is not easy, to say the least. He knows he is lucky to have been in war, survived and returned home in one piece. Now he wants to work with groups like Veterans for Peace and the Maine People’s Alliance to help those in or outside the Army who may be in a situation like his. “I don’t just want to sit around and have conversations about these things,” he said. He plans to head back to college in the fall, studying political science and philosophy at Cornell University in New York.
“PERRY O’BRIEN is one of those who served in Afghanistan and then chose to break ranks after witnessing the carnage and stupidity of war.” – Tom, tomjoad.org
“After Alex was killed in Iraq, my ex-wife told me that he didn’t want to go back … If I had known about Courage to Resist, Alex might be alive today.”
